Trying to Keep an Even Keel
Today has been an interesting day. Things have been rough at times in the past few weeks, certainly seem to be going through a slump. And like any slump you have to try to keep an eye on the horizon for you know that someday soon your luck is going to change and things will turn around and once again life will be good. But making it through a tough slump is no fun, and one lasting a few weeks to a few months is certainly something you look to get out of as soon as possible.
On the downside, last night my son told me the keyboard on the kid's computer (a Mac mini) was messed up, so I went to look at it and see what the problem was. Well... it wasn't the keyboard - it was the mini! It would start to power up, I could hear the DVD engage, and the light on the front came on, but no chime, and that means bad news. I took it apart to see if it was a simple RAM seating problem - nope. Maybe the drive connector - nope. I was thinking that it was a bad drive and that would be horrible as all the kid's stuff is on the box. I have some backups, but nothing recent, and there's stuff there that is really nice.
So this morning, I did some googling and found out that it might be the power supply, or the system board, or maybe the battery, but it's something along those lines. Most likely not the hard drive. That was definitely on the upside. Tonight I have to go home and try out a few things, and if nothing works, it's time to go to the Apple store and see what they can do for me. Not ideal, but saving the data is now priority 1. As soon as it's set up, we're getting a nightly backup in place. Not going to let this happen again. Ever.
On the downside, I had another run in with the Rock Star and his own unique way of suggesting an idea. This time, he was saying that one of the methods on an object was not very strong. I looked at it, and it looked acceptable to me - certainly within the guidelines in the comments on the method. But he said how I should look at the code for a Java class and how it does the same thing the safe way. Well, I looked, and it did virtually the exact same thing. Nearly identical. When I pointed this out to him, he agreed, and then apologized - he'd not read the comments and formed a bad opinion. On top of that, the code he referenced was not what he thought - and it only bolstered my code. This is what's aggravating me about this guy - why not ask? Why accuse? Why not discuss the possibility? Why point out what's wrong and how to make it right - when in fact, all he did was show himself to be a lazy reader and have a poor memory.
So while that appears to be an upside, I talked to him and he doesn't see it as something to avoid. He didn't think there was anything wrong with his approach. This means that he's going to be doing it again, and again, and again... and after a while this is going to be really annoying. Maybe I'll just assume he doesn't know what he's talking about and force him to re-read the code, but my guess is he's going to be a pain in the neck for as long as he's here. That's too bad. Maybe when he learns enough of the systems he'll stop asking the questions. Hopefully.
Work is stressful even under the best of circumstances. The demands are high, the responsibilities for someone willing to accept them are high, and thankfully the rewards are high (otherwise it'd be a losing proposition). But there's got to be a way to get out of this slump and get back on top of the game. I know it's as much attitude as anything else, and getting that positive mental attitude is hard when you're in the slump. I just have to keep looking at the horizon. It'll come, I know it will.